“………… Cultural knowledge and way of life from Europe and China entered the Ottoman Empire through many and varied channels, both official and civil, but they all influenced different levels of Ottoman society in different ways. Pen ~ Fun ~ Pavilion www.biquge.info So far, the most obvious and gratifying part of the reform is in the army, where officers and technicians from Europe and China are working hard to introduce all kinds of military technology and weapons to the new Ottoman army and the young Ottomans in the schools. These new Ottoman officers and young students also formed a new political group in Ottoman society. ……”

Pang Zhenkun's recital has always been a ten-year-on-one, and it was directly handed to Chen Ming's hand. Although it was expensive, it also gave Chen Ming a more accurate grasp of the development of the Ottoman situation. Although Chen Ming was not ignorant of Osman's evidence, he now undoubtedly had a new understanding and a deeper understanding of Osman.

The Ottoman army, politics, faith, and economy had countless contradictions, and in Chen Ming's view, it was like China at the end of the Qing Dynasty. The military and political conservative forces are like the diehards of the late Qing Dynasty, and the new reform group is like the Westernists of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and some of them are in high positions in the Ottoman country, and they still control a good number of armed forces, but these are so weak in the face of the whole old and rotten Ottoman society.

And the Ottoman faith order was not inferior to the decadent Confucianism of the late Qing Dynasty.

At the same time, the fierce national contradictions within the Ottomans were no worse than the Manchu-Han dispute at the end of the Qing Dynasty. The Ottoman royal family was even inferior to the Manchu royal family, which managed to raise a large number of loyal horses from other races, while the Ottoman Empire was almost entirely supported by the Ottoman people.

As for the 'emerging political group' in Pang Zhenkun's mouth, it should be the reformist/constitutionalist in the late Qing Dynasty.

Chen Ming continued to watch Pang Zhenkun's performance, this time, Pang Zhenkun was more talking about his feelings after arriving at Osman.

"Within the Ottomans, there were no restrictions on their activities." The 'they' here are the 'workers' who came from China to the Ottomans to provide aid. "There were also no special provisions for their contact with the Ottomans. Although they only provided technical and intellectual guidance, under their guidance, many Ottomans were inevitably placed under the influence of our thinking and behavior patterns......"

These reform models were a traditional Ottoman response to the needs of the times. Pang Zhenkun, who came to the Ottoman in person, after personally feeling the complexity of Ottoman society and the strength of the stubborn forces, once again felt that Selim III was a smart man, and at the beginning of his succession to the throne, he promoted the reformist general Arandar Mustafa Pasha to the position of Grand Vizi, and won the hearts of the reformists in one fell swoop. Even after Arandar Mustafa Pasha was forced to leave the Danube, Selim III firmly grasped the military power of the new army in Istanbul, and it can be said that he fundamentally consolidated his position.

Otherwise, given the strength of the opposition within the Ottoman Empire, it is difficult for Pang Zhenkun to believe that Selim III will always be able to sit on the throne of the sultan. You must know that this guy has inherited the throne of the Sultan for so many years, and Istanbul and the Sultan's royal palace are still full of countless conservative figures. In particular, his approach to the Order, although it has dealt a blow to the Order's influence, shows great respect for it in these matters. The most obvious example is the Wahhabi Order on the Celestial Peninsula, the Saudi family touches the tiger's butt everywhere, and Selim III can only use Chen Han's hand to completely exterminate it in order not to completely turn his face with the power of the Order.

Pang Zhenkun was not optimistic about the future of the Ottomans, but he believed that Selim III's reforms would last the Ottoman dynasty for decades. This is like Zhang Juzheng's reform, Pang Zhenkun feels that he is more suitable for this.

The seemingly powerful Ottoman Empire has been struggling in decline for more than a hundred years, but this great empire has obviously not reached the end of its rope, just like the Ming Dynasty when Zhang Juzheng was in power. The corruption of politics and the danger of the collapse of the dynasty have been seen, but only seen.

At this time, the Ottoman Empire did not have a real modern level school, although the Celestial World had a university very early, and the Celestial Civilization in the Middle Ages was more 'scientific and technological' than Europe, but the Celestial People were to blame the Mongols, it was the Mongol invasion that turned Baghdad into ruins, and also made the brilliant achievements of the Celestial Science and Technology Civilization come to naught, leaving only a copy of the "Celestial Classic".

Now, with the support of Chen Han, they have set up schools, and the whole new education system has been completely adapted from China, from primary school to university. This does not mean that the Ottomans were truly secularized, truly 'civilized'. Modern thought has not taken root here, but Pang Zhenkun believes that it must have left a seed, the reformist, waiting for the next period to blossom into a real flower.

Chen Ming also thinks so. Wasn't that the case in China at the end of the Qing Dynasty? First there was the seed - the Westernists, then the blossoms - the reformers, and finally the result - the revolution!

“…… Selim III had a lot of opponents, although I knew this before, I saw the report of the special envoy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Istanbul a long time ago, but if I didn't come to Osman in person, I didn't experience it myself, I wouldn't know how many opponents he had. ”

"Actions against Selim III in Istanbul, throughout the Ottomans, have been brewing for a long time. The Ghanishari legion and others threatened by Selim III's reforms had been in turmoil since the early days of Selim III's reign. The elders were also adamantly opposed to Selim III, and most of them considered each of Selim's innovations to be an infringement of the laws and traditions of the Celestial Sect. Many other Ottomans, including some reformers, are now beginning to recognize the potentially devastating power of the new secularist view on the Ottoman 'traditional culture'. Therefore, they demanded that the Ottomans be brought back to the past after a certain degree of reform. ”

"Selim III confiscated many fiefdoms of feudal lords and vigorously reformed the old army, which increased the resentment of some people. Moreover, the reforms were carried out without any rational fiscal policy, and the reduction of the value of the currency and the huge government spending led to new inflation, which made many of the Ottoman population resentful of Selim III and his various reforms, believing that all the difficulties they now face were the result of these reforms. ”

Chen Ming was a little emotional when he read this, he was glad that he had traveled to the Qianlong period, not the end of the Ming Dynasty and the end of the Qing Dynasty, where the entire society was rotten, and when external pressure was as great as a mountain.

Pang Zhenkun said that there was no rational fiscal policy and financial means to reduce the ratio, so that in the end, the inflation caused by it, Chen Ming felt a headache when he thought about it. In finance, he has never started, and even now he seems to understand it. Moreover, Selim III's policies also divided the reformers themselves into a number of hostile factions, which fought not only against the conservatives, but also against each other, which kept Selim III firmly in power but also weakened the political power of his supporters, the reformers. He has not yet suffered any crisis, but Selim III is ten years younger than Chen Ming, he is not yet fifty years old, and he still has at least ten years to rule. In the future, the situation that the Ottomans had to face was indispensable for war, which would lead to crises, and what Sudan needed most in times of crisis was the support of this political force.

But Chen Ming can't say that Selim III's choice is wrong. If he had been Selim III, he would probably have made the same choice. This reminded Chen Ming of the late Qing Dynasty in the original time and space, and the reform strength at that time, whether it was the Westernists, the Restorationists, and even the last revolutionaries, were all fragmented.

There were still a small number of religious elders in the Ottoman territory who did not blindly oppose reform, they were like the enlightened gentry at the end of the Qing Dynasty, who knew that the situation could no longer be reformed, but they opposed radical and wavering reform. In fact, they hope to make the Ottomans completely strong in their own way and in their own system, just like the 'use in Western learning' in the original time and space! They also knew that the Ottomans were corrupted, and they longed to restore the infinite glory of the Ottoman power.

Together with Pang Zhenkun's recital, there was a lot of information in other aspects that was handed to Chen Ming. The MIA has been working hard in the Celestial World for decades, and Chen Han's in-depth cooperation with the Ottoman Empire and the Suez Canal project have allowed the MIA to penetrate deeper into Ottoman society.

Among the information sent this time, there was a lot of feedback from the Military Intelligence Agency on the development of the Ottoman economy. In previous times, before the union of Chen Han and the Ottomans, the Ottoman Empire was almost completely economically isolated, and they were forced to submit to the expansion of European commercial power, and European merchants used "concession" agreements to squeeze Ottoman merchants and extract the raw materials of this empire at relatively cheap prices - something that was indispensable to commerce. But the Ottoman guilds also exerted their 'might' at this time, making their rules more restrictive, using their natural connection with the government to preserve some of their interests to a certain extent, while also preventing the influx of new labor and technology that would have allowed them to develop the ability to resist and compete with European commerce.

These guilds protected Ottoman interests on the one hand, and on the other hand they hindered Ottoman development. But after the confluence of the Ottoman guilds in Istanbul and at the Chinese state level, they became as thin as tissue paper.

The commercial trade and technology import between China and the Ottoman Empire allowed the modern industry in the Ottoman territory to accumulate to a certain extent, although the development of modern Ottoman industry was still difficult, but they were always developing.

All this reminded Chen Ming of the Manchu Qing Dynasty in the original time and space. How similar, it's no wonder that Ottoman was called the sick man of West Asia in the original plane. It was really sick. As for the current Ottomans, with China's help, perhaps it will be like a big green fruit before the First Sino-Japanese War, and the tiger skin of the Westernization Movement for decades still has a little deterrent power, so that they have a period of Zhongxing such as 'Tongzhi Zhongxing'.

Of course, in terms of force, the Ottomans at this time still had a certain advantage. It's just that this advantage can't last long, it's 1810 now, and in another twenty or thirty years, the industrial revolution in European countries will be completed, and the Ottoman national power at that time will inevitably lag far behind the European powers. At that time, the Ottomans will really look like the Manchu Qing before the First Sino-Japanese War. It's just that the Manchus were a paper tiger at that time, and the Ottomans were a sick and dying tiger.